Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/76163 
Year of Publication: 
2006
Series/Report no.: 
Working Paper No. 0605
Publisher: 
University of Zurich, Socioeconomic Institute, Zurich
Abstract: 
Increasing evidence from the empirical economic and psychological literature suggests that positive and negative well-being are more than opposite ends of the same phenomenon. Two separate measures of the dependent variable may be needed when analyzing the determinants of subjective well-being. We argue that this conclusion reflects in part the use of too restrictive econometric models. A flexible multiple-index ordered probit panel data model with varying thresholds can identify response asymmetries in single-item measures of subjective well-being. An application to data from the German Socio-Economic Panel for 1984-2004 shows that income has only a minor effect on positive subjective well-being but a large effect on negative well-being.
Subjects: 
generalized ordered probit model
marginal probability effects
random and fixed effects
life-satisfaction
JEL: 
I31
D12
C23
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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